The Newbies Guide
The Classic Series

The Classic Series is what the general public thought of as Doctor Who until the advent of the new series in 2005. There were about 160 televised stories, each consisting of somewhere between 2 and either 12 or 14 episodes (though in both cases the exact number depends on how you count) episodes spread across 26 years from the 23rd of November 1963 to the 6th of December 1989. There was also a one-off TV Movie featuring Paul McGann as the Eighth Doctor. Not every story still exists. Large chunks of 1960s Doctor Who were destroyed in the mid-1970s. Many episodes have been recovered, but there are still over 100 episodes which are not available, as well as a few Jon Pertwee ones which are only available in black and white. Every surviving episode has been released either on video or on DVD, or both, and it is possible to obtain reconstructions of the missing stories.